Reviews 2017
Reviews 2017
✭✭✩✩✩
by Carolyn Burns, directed by Simon Phillips
David Mirvish, Royal Alexandra, Toronto
September 24-October 29, 2017
Vandamm: “What possessed you to come blundering in here like this? Could it be an overpowering interest in art?”
David Mirvish is currently presenting the North American premiere of North by Northwest, a stage version of the classic 1959 film by Alfred Hitchcock. There is absolutely no reason to see it. The film is one of Hitchcock’s greatest and you can buy it for a fraction of the price of the cheapest seat at the Royal Alexandra Theatre, whereas the stage version is ill-conceived and has no clear point of view on the material. The result is that the stage version has taken one of the greatest thrillers ever filmed and made it boring.
No one contemplating attending North by Northwest should think that what they will see is like the West End and Broadway hit The 39 Steps, a stage version from 2005 of another Hitchcock classic. Unlike North by Northwest, The 39 Steps has a very clear idea of what it is doing. The premise of The 39 Steps as adapted by Patrick Barlow is that a small theatre company stages Hitchcock’s adventure/thriller on a minuscule budget and using only four actors. The humour derives from the cleverness and imagination of the troupe in accomplishing this seemingly impossible task. The troupe stages the complete movie with minimal props and constantly finds ways to translate cinematic techniques into purely theatrical ones. The show is ultimately a celebration of the theatre.
This is not the case with North by Northwest. The stage adaptation by Carolyn Burns has a cast of 12 and while 10 of them play two or more parts each, it is not the same as trying to stage the play with only four actors. The actors in North by Northwest are also aided by numerous complete costume changes, set changes and an abundance of props and lighting effects.
The only use of theatrical invention seems confined to the presentation of modes of transportation. Actors sit on a sofa or in chairs and are then pushed around the stage as if they were in cars. The huge flaw in this is that Phillips sees the need to provide projected background animation to complete the illusion. To do this he has two booths on the far right and left of the stage equipped with video cameras. For rides through New York City, the operators left and right turn cylinders with window cutouts that they project on the large screen that covers the back wall to look like passing buildings. When Thornhill takes his drunken ride down a mountain, the operator on stage left turns a miniature mountain with selected model cars on it to project on the screen.
Phillips also uses projected computer animated backdrops designed by Joh Burns of very rudimentary quality. For some reason in the corn field backdrop used for the famous cropdusting scene, the yellow from the corn is reflected as yellow smudges in the sky. Though Bush uses a not very well done image of Mount Rushmore for the finale, Phillips also uses a video projection from the two booths that is quite funny but for that reason prevents any tension from building up for the climax.
The staging of the play itself is a problem but so is discovering the reason for the staging in the first place. Burns and Phillips begins North by Northwest as if it will be a satire of the film. The cast assembles to tear off letters to spell out the credits including one claiming that the show will be presented “by a cast of thousands”, a credit not in the film. Then when the cast arrives at the director’s name its letters are jumbled and the cast has to jockey about until they spell “Sir Alfred Hitchcock” correctly. (Hitchcock was not knighted until 20 years after North by Northwest and three years after his final film.)
Yet, after this silly attempt to be funny, the adaptation is played with complete seriousness until we arrive at the goofy projections of Mount Rushmore for the final scenes. In between it is only the makeshift quality of the video projections that, intentionally or not, lend any humour to the play. So what is Phillips goal? If he intends the play to be a serious adaptation of the film to the stage, he ruins that effort pretty thoroughly with his cheap special effects and his comical Mount Rushmore. If he intends the entire show to be a send-up of the movie, why does he direct the actors to play long swaths of not especially interesting dialogue so earnestly? Not understanding the tone the director intends is a major factor in undermining our interest in what happens on stage. Besides that, without finding theatrical means of focussing, close-ups, cutting and all the other means directors use to pace a film, Phillips’ direction comes off as very flat. Often only the use of Bernhard Hermann’s fantastic original score suggest the excitement that ought to exist on stage but does not.
As Roger Thornhill, the advertising executive mistaken for a spy, Jonathan Watton is tall, dark and handsome and has mastered the upper class East Coast flavour and accentuation of Cary Grant in the film. What fails to come across is the tone of irony inherent in all Grant says along with a clear idea of Thornhill’s personality.
As Eve Kendall, Olivia Fines makes a very positive impression. Her Eve is much more overtly sexual than was Eva Marie Saint in the film and she convincingly traverses her dramatic arc from sensuousness to anger to fear to love. As the villain, Phillip Vandamm, Gerald Kyd matches up quite well to James Mason in the film and even reproduced his measured manner of speech where the calmness of delivery belies the violence of his intent.
In other roles, Abigail McKern is very funny as Thornhill’s mother who still treats her grown-up son as a little boy but can play the “little old lady” when required. She is also excellent in her other main role as Vandamm’s menacing housekeeper. Tom Davey lends the role of Leonard, one of Vandamm’s henchman a touch of psychotic jealousy. And Nick Harris does well distinguishing his ten roles that include a slow-talking hick in the cornfield, a fey auctioneer, an outraged Lester Townsend and Hitchcock himself in his cameo.
Given the lack of tension in what is supposed to be a thriller, the unimpressive special effects, the confused tone of the presentation not to mention the overall pointlessness of the whole endeavour, one wonders why this show was given a green light at all. It was a great success when it premiered in Melbourne, Australia, in 2015, and apparently when it was staged in Bath, UK. But it is unlikely to play in London or New York anytime soon.
In Toronto we have seen plays by Robert Lepage (Needles and Opium in 2013) or by M. Lemieux and Victor Pilon (La Belle et la Bête in 2012) that integrate live action and video to a much higher level of perfection than does Phillips. But if directors adapt a film to the stage, they should steer clear of video and rely on what will make the film work best on stage through purely theatrical means. As it is, this pale reflection of a great film made me want to rent the real thing as soon as possible to wash this tedious imitation from my mind.
©Christopher Hoile
Note: This review is a Stage Door exclusive.
Photos: (from top) Olivia Fines as Eve and Jonathan Watton as Thornhill; Jonathan Watton and Tom Davey; the cast of North by Northwest. ©2017 Nobby Clark for the Theatre Royal Bath.
For tickets, visit www.mirvish.com.
2017-09-27
North by Northwest